Chapter 149: Full Reservations

"We’re not." Tessa shook her head. "We’re both willing to try. We have counselling scheduled," she added. "And we plan to take this really seriously."

"You don’t have to explain anything to me, T. But if you ever need me..." Naomi said.

Tessa gave her a small smile. "I know. I know..."

Naomi squeezed her hand once before pulling away. "I have to head to the restaurant."

"Sure..."

They both got to their feet, gathered their things and went their separate ways.

A few minutes later, Naomi was pulling into the restaurant parking lot.

Her phone was still buzzing every few minutes with another notification. Naomi parked, took a breath and headed inside through the staff entrance.

The kitchen was already alive. People were moving fast, stations were being set up, ingredients were being prepped, and the entire place had that familiar pre-service energy that usually settled Naomi almost immediately.

Today, however, the moment she stepped inside, her boss spotted her.

"Naomi! The woman of the hour!" Mr. Vale laughed as he walked toward her.

"Mr. Vale? Did you have too much to drink?"

He laughed harder. "Do you have any idea how many reservations we have for tonight?"

Naomi glanced around. "No?"

"We are full. And we aren’t even open yet." Mr. Vale looked delighted. "And it’s all thanks to you!"

"Me?"

"Yes, you." He gestured toward her. "You are everywhere. Everyone wants to know where the famous Wife of the Year cooks."

Naomi groaned. "Please don’t call me that."

"I absolutely will if it keeps filling tables."

"I guess I better get to work then." She looked around the kitchen.

Most of the staff were already in position, some of them watching her with obvious amusement.

"I’m so glad I made you my head chef."

"Yes, me too."

Very glad, actually. And very aware that this might be the perfect time to ask for a raise. If there was ever a moment to walk into Mr. Vale’s office and say, So, about my salary...

This was it.

Naomi reached for her uniform where it hung nearby.

What if all of this fizzled out in a week? What if she asked for more money now and looked ridiculous when the hype disappeared?

Maybe she should wait. At least a little. See whether the attention actually lasted. Still, one thing was becoming impossible to ignore.

If she planned to keep accepting the catering requests currently flooding her phone, something had to give.

She already worked at the bakery. She already worked here.

If even half those catering requests were serious, there was no way she could keep doing everything.

And that meant one uncomfortable truth. She would need to quit the bakery.

She could work for herself during the day and work at the restaurant at night. She just had to wait a few more days and see how it goes.

*****

Alistair Heathcliffe decided his little dependent influencer needed some help getting access to Dorian’s life.

Camille had a plan.

Alistair would make sure she actually had a chance of pulling it off.

The first thing he did was arrange for the lobby receptionist to send him the full list of candidates scheduled to interview with Dorian for the assistant position.

Alistair went through the list carefully.

There were a few impressive candidates. People Dorian would actually notice. People with strong legal backgrounds, excellent references and enough experience to make themselves serious contenders.

Those names disappeared. By the time Alistair was finished, the shortlist had become considerably less competitive.

He forwarded the handpicked version back.

Camille’s plant remained safely on it.

If Dorian had several brilliant options, there was no guarantee he would choose the woman Camille wanted near him.

But if he had to wade through mediocrity first? Eventually, competence would start looking like a miracle.

And by the time Dorian had interviewed about five prospects, a miracle was exactly what he needed.

He sat behind his desk wondering whether the education system had suffered some catastrophic decline while he wasn’t paying attention.

There was no way he could hire any of these people.

None.

The first woman had walked into his office wearing heels so high Dorian spent half the interview genuinely concerned she might snap an ankle and somehow make him legally responsible.

She had excellent posture.

That was about where the excellence ended.

Another applicant had clearly researched Dorian more thoroughly than the job itself. She spent half the interview agreeing with everything he said and the other half smiling at him like they were on a date.

The next male applicant couldn’t hold a proper intelligent conversation for more than thirty seconds.

His paperwork was scattered. His notes were scattered. His answers were scattered.

Dorian suspected his thoughts were scattered somewhere outside the building as well.

By midday, he was beginning to regret fake-firing Adrian at all.

He leaned back in his chair and rubbed a hand over his face. He hadn’t interviewed assistants in years.

Adrian had been there so long that Dorian had forgotten how much work finding someone competent actually required.

Dorian checked the remaining name on the schedule.

Final applicant.

Thank God.

A few minutes later, the door opened.

The woman who entered was professionally dressed, formal without being flashy.

No expression suggesting she had come looking for a wealthy lawyer to fund her lifestyle.

Dorian had already been disappointed too many times that morning to get excited.

She took the chair across from him and placed her folder neatly on the desk.

Dorian glanced through her résumé, then looked up. He was tired of standard interview questions.

Where do you see yourself in five years? What are your weaknesses?

He didn’t care. He needed to know whether she could survive working for him when everything went wrong at once.

So he closed the résumé.

The woman straightened slightly.

Dorian folded his hands on the desk.

"Trial starts Monday. My primary witness disappears Friday evening. The prosecution drops six hundred pages of discovery at four-thirty. What do you do?"